Community-Based Art and Gentrification: A Bronzeville Story

Abstract

This text relates the observation of the ongoing changes in the evolving African American community of Bronzeville, Chicago and how community-based art can function as an asset in the recognition and development of its cultural foundation. Community-based art is defined as art that is by, for and about community members and their spaces, created with their participation. Gentrification is defined here as the renewal of a community that includes replacement of former residents of modest means with more affluent new residents. The text also suggests ways that community-based art can function as an agent for memory-keeping and future community development which includes the relevance of community members as knowledgeable arbiters involved in the rebirth of their historic spaces encourages the thoughtful process of cognitively and emotionally interacting with the art stories of other communities.